Making Magic: Brewing Mead
by Rich Webb, Mead Master and Brews Brothers tm 1993 Homebrewer of the year
At it's most simple, mead is a fermented beverage that uses honey as its primary source of sugar. (This compares most favorably with wine, where the grapes supply a ready source of sugar, and most unfavorably with beer or sake, where the sugars come from starch in grain, which is transformed, into sugar by enzymes.) Because the sugar is readily available, making mead is much easier to make than beer, but slightly more difficult to make than wine. There is no need to spend the entire day mashing grain, nor is there any need to spend an hour or more in a full boil as with beer. Honey also mixes well with other juices and sugar sources, and so leads to a great variety of fermentation experiments. I've also made meads with blueberry, raspberry, apple, cherries, wine grape juice, chili peppers, spices, and malt sugars. I've had no small measure of success with several of these, and I have the ribbons and trophies to prove it.
A typical 5-gallon batch of mead starts with a gallon of honey. This will typically run about $20-28, depending on the source. (Remember, it takes over 2 million trips by a bee to a flower and back to the hive for each pound of honey, so don't expect this stuff to come cheap!) This much honey in this much water will yield a fermentable liquid (called "must" like beer is called "wort") with a starting gravity of about 1.080 to 1.090. Adjust this up or down depending on what you are trying to achieve. The higher gravities lead to a more wine-like drink, while lighter gravities can seem more like champagne, or alcoholic soda pop in the extreme.
As a process, start with the water. Bring your 4.5 or so gallons of water up to a steady, rolling boil. Because honey does not have sufficient nutrients to enable yeast to undergo a vigorous and healthy ferment, put perhaps 1 tsp of yeast nutrient, or 3 tsp of yeast energizer (follow package directions, but err on the side of less is better) into the vigorous boil. You will also find that the sweetness of the mead requires the sour tartness of some sort of acid in order to balance it out. I've added from 1 to 3 tsp of acid blend, grape tannin, citric acid, or a combination thereof to this rapid boil. However, the fermentation will be more vigorous if you wait until after fermentation to add the acid. It is also easier to blend the acid to your taste if you wait until after the fermentation. When to add the acid is up to you. Pour the honey into this hot bath, and turn off the heat. Cover the must and hold this temperature for a while. You can imagine that during those 24 million trips the bees made to gather the nectar to make the honey, that somewhere along the line some sort of contamination managed to get into the honey. In fact, honey is actually well contaminated with bacteria, fungus, spores, bee parts, protein, and God knows what else, so steep the must at pasteurization temperatures for as long as half an hour, but for at least 15 minutes. Instead of steeping, you may choose to boil your honey for a while. This will make your final mead much clearer, but the penalty you pay will be a reduced (or non-existent) honey aroma profile: you will have boiled it all away. However, you can take the opportunity to boil and add Irish Moss. A white to yellow scum will rise to the top of the boil. Use a skimming spoon to remove this from the boil. Using some sort of heat exchanger, chill the must as rapidly as possible, aerate, and add a healthy and vigorous yeast starter.
Because mead is a rather high gravity ferment, good yeast techniques are more important than in regular gravity beer ferments. This is good advice for all brewing experiments, but make sure that you pitch a sufficient quantity of yeast slurry when pitching into higher gravity musts. If in doubt, you aren't pitching enough. The more yeast cells in your initial pitching, the faster and more complete your fermentation will be. The same advice applies to aeration. If you can inject filtered atmosphere (or ultimately, pure, medical quality oxygen), your yeast lag time (initial, reproductive phase) of the ferment will be minimized, and a healthier fermentation will be the result.
As far as yeast types go, I'd encourage experimentation. I've had excellent luck with Red Star Pasteur Champagne yeast (in contrast with my comments in the previous paragraph, I've often just chucked a package of dry yeast, right out of the package, onto the cool must, shaken the hell out of it and then let it go. We can't all be perfect all of the time!). Epernay is NOT the same as champagne yeast. While Champagne yeast is SO2 tolerant, Epernay (which is now called "cotes de blanc") is not. Champagne yeast is very alcohol tolerant, and epernay isn't. Champagne yeast is natural flavored and ferments to dryness, epernay leaves a residual fruitiness, but as far as yeast flavors go, is also "natural."
Lately, I've tried some of the more popular Wyeast cultures, owing to their lower attenuation characteristics compared to the more traditional wine yeasts. (I haven't tried this with any of the lager strains, but that is on my list of things to do!) Using the wine yeasts will result in a more alcoholic mead, and one that is less sweet. If you prefer sweeter wines, then choose a yeast that will peter out at a lower alcohol tolerance.
Mead making does take longer than beer making. This is true for a couple of reasons. First, it is a high gravity ferment, and by definition, this takes longer than a low gravity ferment. Second, an insufficient yeast population is often used, resulting in an even longer ferment. Third, it is often true that the fermentation is done, but you simply find yourself waiting for the yeast and suspended protein to settle out of the liquid. (If you have some sort of filtration system that will remove these floaters, your wait will be proportionately shorter.) Finally, if you used too much yeast nutrient, it will take longer for the harsh, metallic "off-flavors" from these salts and chemicals to recede into background levels. If you used too little nutrient, then the yeast in your ferment is running a marathon with the nutrition of a candy bar. There simply isn't a healthy enough environment for the yeasts pleasure.
Finally, a note on adding fruits, spices, or herbs to your mead. It might be best to have a vigorous initial ferment with just honey, then rack onto the crushed and pulverized fruit. (Don't use a food processor or blender to liquify the fruit: Aeration of the fruit will lead to oxidation of the alcohol, leading to wet cardboard type aromas and tastes) If you're worried about the sanitation of the fruit, heat it up to pasteurization temperatures, but no higher. The pectin in the fruit may set, leading to a permanent haze floating in your mead. It may also be wise to add spices, herbs, and chili peppers to taste, because too much of a good thing can be quite overwhelming! If you add fruits or malt sugars, you can cut down on the yeast nutrients, as these sources bring much needed natural nutrition to the fermentation.
Creation of Must
Bring 4.5 gallons of water to boil
Add 1 gallon of honey and stir well, mixing thoroughly. Turn off heat, and wait. Pasteurization should take place at 170o or so for at least 20 minutes.
Chill as rapidly as possible
When cooled, transfer to a sterile fermentation container. Aerate well, and add one teaspoon of yeast nutrient (or follow directions on the package). Also add a large quantity of yeast slurry.
End of Fermentation
When fermentation slows noticeably, rack to another fermentation vessel
Bottling or Kegging
Use ¾ cup of corn sugar for bottle priming, less for kegging
Use 1 teaspoon of acid blend to balance residual honey sweetness